We have summer starting on the northern hemisphere these days – and with that comes, in many parts of Europe and North America, the season of frequent thunderstorms.

In OpenStreetMap there currently is a different kind of storm brewing of a more social nature that is probably hard to accurately understand and interpret for many outsiders and that also touches a few topics i have recently been writing about so i want to make a few comments.

The dispute/conflict i am talking about is centered around the framework that powers the main OpenStreetMap website but it expands into the matter of governance of community projects in OpenStreetMap in general and the question of generational turnover, which i have recently written about as well.

Components of these discussions can be found on:

• Microgrant Proposal: Atlas Design System & Modernization of OSM.org – github discussion
• Why are we creating a design system for OSM? – diary entry
• Why are we creating a design system for OSM? – forum discussion
• How is “Core Software” governance managed in OpenStreetMap, and who decides which projects are included? – forum discussion

Now there is a bit of wider context that is very useful to know in that regard, namely that the OpenStreetMap Foundation recently started the economically largest externally financed project in its history in direct relation to the OpenStreetMap website. The OSMF has been and is fairly opaque about the details of this – we only know the very limited communication in public that has been made by the OSMF. No details on the contractual terms under which the money is given to the OSMF are publicly known. What we do know is that the overall financial volume of this project is 384k.

In parallel to that the Engineering Working group is these days taking submissions for their microgrants programme with a maximum volume per project (as announced) of 6k. One of the links above goes to the discussion on one of the submissions for that.

A lot could be discussed about the details of both of these financial endeavors – and the problematic effects this kind of money spending has on intrinsically motivated volunteers in the OSM community – but this is not my topic today. The mentioned economic developments are the main reason why these discussions develop right now and why they are centered around the OpenStreetMap website. And there is of course also the different diverging interests different parts of the OSMF are pursuing in that context. What i want to focus on here, however, are more the underlying issues behind the mentioned discussions.

The point i want to mainly make here is that this illustrates exactly the kind of generational turnover problem that i have discussed recently. Like any other community, the OSM community needs to manage a generational turnover to function in the long term. And to do that it needs to find a balance between giving new generations of community members the room and the resources to develop beyond the horizon of the previous generations and – at the same time – maintaining and valuing the wisdom and experience of the older and more experienced community members.

Normally, in the larger intrinsically motivated OSM community, this process would be facilitated primarily by different projects existing in parallel (think: different editors for editing OSM data, different QA tools, different map styles), controlled by different generations of community members, respecting and supporting each other and this way ensuring a smooth transfer of knowledge and a fair distribution of resources between different generations.

This mechanism will already get in serious peril once you mix in a substantial amount of extrinsic motivation (i.e. money, or even the vague promise of money). But we are, furthermore, talking about those parts of the OSM ecosystem here where – either inherently or by choice – there are not multiple independent projects existing in parallel but where there is a monopoly – or at least a massive market concentration and a very small oligopoly.

And most of these cases are somehow under the aegis of the OSMF. Even if the projects are formally independent, it is the OSMF that de facto gives exactly one project its endorsement and selects it for its purposes. Whether that was a conscious choice or it just happened to be how things turned out does not matter.

So it would be the OSMF’s responsibility to facilitate the generational turnover in those cases. But that is, of course, not really realistic, since the OSMF already struggles massively with the generational turnover in its own organizational structure.

What can the OSM community do here? Try to create diversity in methods and tools based on your own initiative. And this is what is happening with the website to some extent of course (see also here). But a true generational turnover will still be difficult because the mentioned balance is hard to achieve with OSMF sticking firmly to the existing monopoly without any strategic vision being communicated how this would develop in the long term. And also because these alternative projects might have more the primary aim to displace the existing website project rather than serving as an instrument to facilitate the generational succession.

In the absence of an OSMF embracing and living up to their responsibility it is primarily up to the old-timers in the various projects that have the privilege and the burden to play key roles in the OSMF portfolio to create the conditions under which a true generational turnover can happen. Try to be supportive to those who want and need to learn from you, especially if they want to do it with approaches that are different from your own. Try to embrace diversity in methods and tools and don’t see newcomers primarily as competition. You should see the younger generation as partners in the effort to bring OpenStreetMap forward in the long term. Don’t expect them to work for you or to align with your ideas how things should be done. And keep in mind that educating younger people is not only about communicating your knowledge and experience and teaching them the practical ropes, but also about sharing ideas of quality and excellency.

But the initiative needs to ultimately come from the aspirational young generation to reach out to the old-timers managing the incumbent projects. You should see them as the carriers of knowledge and experience you can learn a lot from rather than the obstacles in your way to your individual goals. You depend on them for successfully shaping the future of OpenStreetMap, just as much as they depend on you to do so. Don’t expect to be handed things on a silver platter, if you want to go new paths and pursue new ideas be ready and willing to do the necessary ground work. You should be able to expect the older generation to share their wisdom and experience with you, but not to do the work for you.

And finally to both sides: Be mindful of the economic context. If you are getting paid in some way in context of your OSM related work or if you are aiming to start a professional career related to OpenStreetMap your interaction with an intrinsically motivated volunteer needs to take that difference into consideration. The OSMF is treating this as a zero sum game and is handing out money according to the Matthew principle in the hope to have a single clear market leader that is tied to them through economic dependencies and personal relationships. Don’t make the mistake of buying into that system, even if you seem to profit from it at the moment.

And most importantly: While i have provided some analysis on why things are the way they are and what approaches might be viable to deal with the need for generational succession under these somewhat adverse conditions, i do not have all the answers. I encourage you to develop your own thoughts how to facilitate a generational turnover and present and discuss these thoughts openly.

I also want to acknowledge that the OpenStreetMap website project is, in addition, putting a lot of effort into facilitating a generational turnover within the project. That is commendable. But it is not a substitute for giving new generations the space to explore and develop completely new approaches independently within the overall community.

The other thing the OSM community can and should do is to put serious pressure on the OSMF to pull their heads out of the sand, so to speak, to stop ignoring the problem and start accepting responsibility. And that does not mean for the OSMF to start to boss people around or to simply get rid of the independent projects (which seems to be the direction where things are currently going – either by existing projects becoming more dependent or by replacing them with projects more inherently aligned with the OSMF). It means starting to think strategically and beginning to value and nurture competency and experience in the larger community rather than people whose work we know and enjoy. No one expects the OSMF to actually come up with solutions here (this would be fairly unrealistic, see above). But acknowledging responsibility for the choices made would be an important first step.

And since some will likely wonder: Yes, i also have OSM-Carto in mind here – although this is neither software nor ‘core’. As regular readers of this blog know, i have invested quite a lot of time the last years to proactively share quite a bit of my map design experience. And i have repeatedly called to develop true alternatives to OSM-Carto with comparable goals and ambitions for many years and encouraged people to start such projects. But, as i have also discussed in the past, talent and experience are only one factor here deciding if a true generational turnover is possible in the field of map design – the other is the availability of suitable tools and a supportive social environment for design work.